Urine The Sunshine

Yeah, we can thank Reagan for the crack epidemic as well. Remember Iran-Contra? Many of the same people involved in that debacle are presently members of Bush's inner circle … go figure.

We can also thank our beloved boob for deregulation, which basically took all of the social services guaranteed to everyone by the government and gave them to corporations so they could run them (into the ground) for profit by a few, already wealthy individuals. That was the beginning of the end for the American dream, in my view.

Does anyone remember the Savings and Loan scandal? And don't forget how many careers Reagan ruined as one of Hollywood's biggest snitches for Joseph McCarthy during the HUAC commie witch hunts in the '50s …

What a great guy. Multi-talented. A terrible actor, a terrible governor and a terrible president, but a great guy! Frankly, I'm convinced the reason Reagan hadn't appeared in public since he was diagnosed with Alzheimer's is because we would have noticed right away that his behavior was virtually no different from when he was the ruler of the free world.

As a disabled veteran, I see another very bad consequence of the torture of Iraqi (and probably Gitmo) prisoners: What becomes of the soldier who participates in such a horrible treatment of people? Based on the gleeful expressions on their faces and joking around, some soldiers enjoyed torturing. A person getting a big kick out of dehumanizing and torturing people—especially sexually—is not going to return to his/her family, neighborhood, job and community as a normal person. Recall that Timothy Mc Veigh served in Gulf War I.

I do not believe that Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush did not know how these prisoners were being treated for such a large scale, long term operation involving many people in a prison already notorious for torture. But whether or not they did or did not know, they should have known. They are fully responsible for all people under their commands. And based on the evidence so far, at best, Bush left the strong impression that torture is both justifiable and Constitutional.

In fact, I see no indication from Bush or Cheney that they personally believe that people have any human rights, or for that matter, any kind of rights to protect themselves from government abuses. Bush's abysmal right attitude is not only reflected by the prisoner treatment issues, his memos and his lame excuses and crappy apologies about them, but also his judiciary appointments—virtually all anti—rights automatons.

The former Soviet Union also never, according to its leaders, violated human rights. Soviet leaders insisted to the end that people weren't being tortured and murdered in gulags and other prisons and camps, but were being “re-educated” in “re-education camps.” Our leaders now act the same. To them no one has or should have human rights when it comes to our own government. Consequently, the actions of our country's torturers have virtually ruined the reputation of the United States and its fighting forces among the rest of the world, especially among Arabs and Muslims. When you sow, you reap the whirlwind!

[RE: Gallery Review, June 3—9] “Worlds Collide?” Come on, man. I expect that kind of barely literate drivel from the undereducated yokels of this hapless burg, but from the arts and literature editor of the Alibi, putative bastion of intellectual refinement in a wasteland of drooling ignorance?

And this on the heels of a review of the new film Troy from which it was abundantly clear that the author (a different criminel du mot) had never read The Iliad, nor, one presumes, even a comic book version thereof. “Introspection is not a trait typically demonstrated by heroes of Greek drama.” Obtuse; frighteningly so.

Alas. Let down by Albuquerque again. Surprise, surprise.